Studies of (TD) and (ING) in King of Prussia (Pennsylvania) families show that children have matched their parents' patterns of variation by age seven, before many categorical phonological and grammatical rules can be established. Some dialect-specific and socially marked constraints are acquired before constraints with general articulatory…

Reported here is the work of two linguists, William Labov and Paul Cohen, and of two black researchers who know the culture of the inner city, Clarence Robins and John Lewis. Together they explore certain aspects of Black English vernacular (BEV) and certain political and cultural aspects of the black community. Part 1 (chapters 1-4) deals with…

Discusses issues which "pertain to the success of children in school in answering test questions, the success of linguistic students in analyzing their answers, and generally the educational institution as a whole." Concludes that, "the main reason for reading failure in the inner cities is the cultural conflict between the educational system and…

This report presents some of the findings of several years research on the relations between the non-standard English used by Negro speakers in various urban ghetto areas (NNE) and standard English (SE). The immediate subject is the status of the copula and auxiliary "be" in NNE. The approach to the problem combines the methods of…

American education has always considered the non-standard or sub-standard form of speech used by children to be an imperfect copy of standard English. The defects of this approach have now become a matter of urgent concern in the face of the tremendous educational problems of the urban ghettos. This paper reverses the usual focus and looks…